Jamie Oliver Big Chair Project

August 2012 was the launch of the much-anticipated Big Chair Project auction site. Participants had the unique opportunity to bid on a number of eye-catching, one-off chairs created by a variety of celebrated artists and designers, from Paul Smith to Sarah Burton. The auction was a “preview”, which ended with a live auction event held on 11th October at Fritz Hansen in London. The highest online bidders for each chair was invited to the live event to bid in person.

We thoroughly customised the site to fit in seamlessly with the appearance and layout of the main Jamie Oliver Big Chair Project website. Lots are displayed in a highly visual manner, allowing users to browse through pictures of the chairs before clicking through to the bidding page. With all the publicity surrounding the site we expected to see high volumes of traffic over the next few weeks, so made use of the benefits of our new six cluster server to ensure the site’s reliability.

The auction accompanied the 10th anniversary of 15, Jamie Oliver’s restaurant chain which trains young people as chefs. The goal of the auction is to raise funds for Jamie Oliver’s Better Food Foundation. The charity was set up to raise awareness about food, and encourages people to learn how to cook and make wise decisions about their diet.